Brick Bay Méthode Traditionnelle Brut NV
After years of anticipation, Brick Bay is excited to introduce our first sparkling wine, the Méthode Traditionnelle. This elegant and lively wine is the perfect bottle to elevate your next celebration.
Tasting Notes
Pale golden with fine, long-lasting bubbles. Toasty aromas, honeyed rock melon and tropical fruits. The vibrant structure culminates in a lingering, complex mineral finish.
In the Vineyard
The Chardonnay and Pinot Noir fruit was sourced from the Lower Wairau plains in Marlborough, hand harvested at optimum ripeness.
The exact harvest period is based on the physical ripeness of the grapes, the potential alcohol content and the level of acidity. For sparkling wine production however, the grapes are picked earlier than still wines as the freshness of higher acidity and lower sugar levels are required. The 2022 growing season in Marlborough was cooler than usual which helped preserve the fruit acidity.
In the Winery
Producing our Brick Bay Méthode Traditionnelle is an intense, time consuming and complicated process.
Made for us in the Hawkes Bay using the age-old Champagne methods, the Pinot Noir and Chardonnay fruit were separately whole bunch pressed, inoculated with a Champagne yeast, fermented, then aged in seasoned French oak barriques.
After undergoing a full malolactic fermentation, the two wines were then blended, and a little extra wine, sugar and selected yeasts added to allow the second fermentation to take place inside the bottle. The yeasts convert the sugars into alcohol and carbon dioxide, but the gas cannot now escape, thus dissolving in the wine. This slow second fermentation ensures beautiful aromas, more complexity and produces the fine bubbles we associate with a Méthode Traditionnelle wine.
Finally, using the traditional riddling method of slowly hand-turning the bottles from the horizontal to an upside down position, the yeast sediment collects in the bottle neck, which is then plunged into a liquid solution of -27°C, creating an ice cube of sediment. The temporary bottle closure is removed, with the internal pressure causing the ice cube to eject and the bottle is then sealed with the final cork and cage.
Ageing potential
Our Méthode Traditionnelle may be confidently aged for a further 5 years from release date.
